In spring 2022 we had a sustainability lead at a contract manufacturer ask us a question that I had not been asked before. She asked: "How can I tell my CFO that buying from you is better than buying from your competitor, when their per-box price is lower than yours?"
The honest answer was that she probably could not, on per-box price alone. Our competitor was offering Grade B-labeled boxes at a price that, on paper, beat ours.
So I asked her to give me a week. We pulled together a comparison sheet that included:
- Per-box price (theirs vs ours).
- Expected trip count per box at the labeled grade.
- Cost-per-trip math.
- Avoided new-procurement cost over a 12-month projection.
- Estimated CO₂ delta against EPA WARM.
- Reuse-rate guarantees with the spec for what triggers credits.
The cost-per-trip and the reuse-rate guarantees were what mattered. Our per-box price was 8% higher; our cost-per-trip was 22% lower; our reuse-rate guarantees were tighter; the carbon delta over a year favored us by a real margin.
She showed the comparison to her CFO. They became a customer for the next four years, eventually expanding to a closed-loop relationship.
What changed for us
Since that quarter, every quote we send to a closed-loop or repeat-volume customer includes a cost-per-trip projection. It takes us five extra minutes per quote. It has been worth a lot more than five minutes.
The CFO question is the right question. The unit-price question is the easy question. We try to give customers something to answer the harder one with.